V. I. Lenin

ON THE KRONSTADT REVOLT

Published:Published in Russian on March 26, 1921 inPetrogradskaya PravdaNo. 67.

      Published in English on March 15, 1921The New York HeraldNo. 197

      Printed from thePetrogradskaya Pravdatext.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1971,

      Moscow,Volume 36,

      page538.Translated:Andrew RothsteinTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive.  

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work, as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.

SUMMARY OF A TALK WITH A CORRESPONDENTof THE NEW YORK HERALD

The first interview was conducted on March 13, 1921. SeeHEREfor that interview. The second interview, conducted on March 26, 1922, isHERE

I believe that there are only two kinds of government
possible in Russia—a Government by the Soviets or a
Government headed by a tsar. Some fools or traitors in
Kronstadt talked of a Constituent Assembly, but does any man
in his senses believe for a moment that a Constituent
Assembly at this critical abnormal stage would be anything
but a bear garden. This Kronstadt affair in itself is a very
petty incident. It no more threatens to break up the Soviet
state than the Irish disorders are threatening to break up
the British Empire.

Some people in America have come to think of the
Bolsheviks as a small clique of very bad men who are
tyrannizing over a vast number of highly intellectual people
who would form an admirable Government among
themselves the moment the Bolshevik regime was overthrown.
This is a mistake, for there is nobody to take our place save
butcher Generals and helpless bureaucrats who have
already displayed their total incapacity for rule.

Ifpeople abroad exaggerate the importance of the rising
in Kronstadt and give it support, it is because the world
has broken up into two camps: capitalism abroad and
Communist Russia.